


Show me your Motivation

by Productive_Writings



Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Bonding over Motivation, F/M, Family Bonding, Gen, Getting to Know Each Other, Small Talk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-17
Updated: 2020-03-17
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:33:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23184064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Productive_Writings/pseuds/Productive_Writings
Summary: One-shot inspired by an anon on tumblr.
Relationships: Kyrie/Nero (Devil May Cry), Nero & Vergil (Devil May Cry)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 57





	Show me your Motivation

**Author's Note:**

> _Anon's prompt-_
> 
> _Vergil: "What is your true motivation?"_  
>  Nero: *thinks about Kyrie*  
> Vergil: "w-why are you blushing?" 

“I want to know why you did what you did in Redgrave City.”

Vergil’s words took Nero back. This wasn’t exactly the father-son bonding exercise he was expecting to be forced into. “What I did? What about you, you’re the one who caused the whole thing!”

Vergil sighed. “And obviously, I did that for power. But I don’t know what motivates you, and if I’m going to understand you, then I need to know that.”

Nero thought for a moment. He honestly considered saying that he wanted power too, like the voice had told him when he first manifested the Devil Bringer, but he knew that wasn’t it. Nero wasn’t his father. He didn’t travel all the way from Fortuna just to take the Yamato back. And besides, hadn’t he told Dante he had all the power he needed? 

Nero knew it wasn’t to save Redgrave, either. If it was, then he would have stayed and tried to get as many people as possible to safety instead of just leaving for a month while he prepared to fight Urizen. It was something more selfish than wanting to save the day; revenge maybe? No, not quite. 

_Guilt._

Nero knew the real reason he wanted to fight Urizen was because he was the demon that had taken his arm, and with it the Yamato - the sword Dante had trusted him to protect - and he wanted to prove to Dante that he hadn’t been wrong to leave the sword with him by joining the fight and being the one to reclaim it. That’s why it stung so much to hear Dante tell him he was ‘dead weight’. It meant that Dante didn’t have any kind of faith in Nero, not any more. No one did.

Well, almost no one. 

Kyrie had always believed in Nero, and he didn’t think there was anything that could alter her opinion of him - not the rumors about his mother when he was a child, not his teenage rebellion from the Order, not his demonic heritage…

Nero remembered when he had used the Devil Bringer to defeat Sanctus and his False Savior, and save Kyrie. He remembered how scared he was that she would turn her back on him, knowing about his true nature, but she held his hand so tenderly, without any fear of it or of him. Nero’s thoughts drifted to their first kiss, as the sun rose over the ruins of the Opera House.

“Why are you blushing, Nero?”

Nero rubbed his nose, embarrassed. “I’m not blushing, you just put me on the spot and I’m just trying to find the answer to your question. We’re not the same. It’s not as clean-cut as ‘I want power’.”

“Then go on, explain.”  


Nero paused, trying to put the answer together in a way that he could articulate. “I guess what motivates me is wanting to prove myself. Prove that I’m more than just some nobody that got dumped at the orphanage, that I’m not a ‘dead weight’, that I can take care of myself no matter what, and anyone else who needs me to. Yeah, I needed to find the strength to be able to do that, but in the end that wasn’t all I was looking for. And it obviously wasn’t all about kicking your ass for what you did to my arm, either, because here we both are. It was about being accepted.”

He shrugged, trying to come off as nonchalant about baring his feelings to a man he should have been so used to sharing them with but hardly knew, and tried to gauge Vergil’s reaction, but he was unreadable. Still, Vergil’s silence seemed like an intrigued invitation to continue with his explanation, so he did.

“There were only four people I knew when I was growing up who treated me like I was worth anything, and three of them are dead now. I guess that’s why I wanted to stop you and Dante from killing each other, because I was sick of losing people, and I didn’t want to watch the family I’d just found out I had just disappear again. So, yeah, that’s why I did what I did in Redgrave City; because I wanted to actually belong somewhere instead of being on my own again.”  


 _‘Dick move fucking off to hell right after that, by the way’_ he thought, but Nero understood, really. Someone had to sever the Qliphoth’s roots, and in some ways doing it himself had been Vergil’s apology for causing the whole mess, so he didn’t actually say it.  


To Nero’s surprise, Vergil lifted a hand and placed it on his son’s shoulder. “I think we’re more similar than you give me credit for.”


End file.
